Luke’s Manufacturing, a local manufacturing company which specializes mainly in cassava products, has recently received its ‘Made in Guyana’ standard mark after almost 10 years in business.
This was revealed by the owner of the company, John Luke, during a recent interview with this publication.
According to Luke, the company received the mark from the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS) about two weeks ago.
Reflecting on the birth of the company, Luke shared that he realized there was a lot of wastage of foods such as cassava, jamun and cherries, and he founded Luke’s Manufacturing with the main focus of using these foods to create products that can be used by consumers daily.
He said the business, which currently operates in the Pomeroon, has approximately 20 workers, who work on a part-time basis. He said they are currently working to expand their operations, which would result in more people being gainfully employed.
Owner of Luke’s Manufacturing, John Luke, receiving his Made in Guyana standards mark
“The plans for the business in the future [are] about creating jobs for the young and elderly. Once they can work, we have jobs to create for them. Also…that we would have trained people to take them to the next level. We embarking [on] training [and] night-&-day job creation. We will have two sessions: 8 hours day, and 8 hours night, because of the increase of sales that will be coming in when we branch out for the online shop,” he explained.
The budding entrepreneur shared that the reason his employees work on a part-time basis is due to the small workspace, which cannot accommodate a large number of persons at the same time. Luke told this publication that the company is currently seeking to acquire land.
“Presently now, what’s [challenging] us is (having) land available to the company, that we can able to expand these kinds of operations. We applied to the Government to get these lands, [and] as soon as we get those land available…then we could able to supply jobs from 25 to 50, and from 50 to 100 persons — increasing job creation. And that is one of the biggest criteria right now…that we’re working on presently now,” Luke explained.
On the topic of challenges, Luke explained that two of the biggest challenges his company is currently facing are: finding adequate storage to keep materials, and shipping that would get his products to foreign countries in the desired timeframe.
“The challenge that we had and having up to now is storing raw materials such as the bottles, [and] the shipment from country to country. One of the big problems we have [presently] to get products out of the country is the shipment. Not getting a proper shipping company that the products can go ahead and they can sell at a reasonable price over there …that’s our biggest problem here right now. We have people willing to take it off over there (the United States and Canada), but the timings that it meeting over there [is challenging]. [We’re] trying to get a better shipping company to get it to ship out,” Luke explained.
Luke’s Manufacturing specialises in cassava seasoning, cassava porridge, cassareep, all-purpose sauce, wines, achar, and many other items which are available at the Guyana Marketing Corporation (GMC) in Georgetown and at several supermarkets and shops in Essequibo.
